The guy we need to see ourselves clearly.

For the next shot he pulls on an ill-fitting suit and too-long tie, and he watches as that same wig is placed on his enormous, groomed head, and he mangles his eyes and pushes out his lips, this tired man made beautiful made ugly. It’s an unsettling transformation to watch. It’s almost as though Alec Baldwin, before he can become Donald Trump, must first become the best version of Alec Baldwin, and then ruin him. […]

Maybe it’s not that he has to ruin the best Alec Baldwin to play Donald Trump. Maybe inhabiting Trump reminds him of the ugly man he is capable of being and the man he would prefer to be. Maybe by playing a person who yearns so deeply for a chorus of praise he will never receive, Baldwin has found the resolve to be his best.

“I wonder if this is the guy we need to see ourselves clearly,” he says.